Assemblymember Wendy Carrillo is a member of the California Assembly Committee on Health. She joins us in this edition of What They’re Watching to discuss mental healthcare in the Los Angeles community.

“I represent the city of Los Angeles and so whatever LA does, I think the state can do. One of the things that I’m focusing on is mental health. We’re seeing a huge increase in our homelessness population and with the development of downtown Los Angeles, a lot of nearby communities are certain to see the effects of that.

So, mental health not only plays a role with our homeless population, and it may be someone that suffers from schizophrenia on the street, but mental health is also the health of our communities. So, we have young people in my district, high school students, who are afraid and have anxiety and depression because of the national shootings across high schools — and that’s very real. We have undocumented parents who are anxious about taking their kids to school because they fear they will get detained and deported. And there was in fact a national case where that happened in my district, in the community of Highland Park.

So, mental health wraparound services for the most vulnerable communities is very real. The state of California allocates millions of dollars to counties across the entire state — LA County in particular is going to play a role, and plays a role in how that funding is used whether it’s for our homelessness issues and population, as well as the health and safety and mental health of our communities.”